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Book Reviews J Book Reviews J. Howard Kauffman and Leo Driedger, Tlze Merzlzorzite Mosaic: Identity nlzd Model-rzization (Scottdale: Herald Press, 1991). Paperback, 308 pages. In 1975 J. Howard Kauffman and Leland Harder published the results of the first major survey of North American Mennonite and Brethren in Christ church members. Melzrzolzite Mosaic reports and interprets the data gathered in a second parallel survey in 1989, seventeen years after the first study. With about two-thirds of the 1989 questions identical to those asked in 1972, valid comparisons can be made and trends discerned. The five denominations studied in both surveys (Mennonite Church, General Conference Mennonite, Mennonite Brethren, Brethren in Christ, and Evangelical Mennonite Church) include some 232,000 of the 300,000 baptized Mennonites in North America. Data were gathered from over 3000 members by a25-page question- naire administered in group settings and analyzed with the aid of current computer technology. The 1972 survey developed a profile of religious beliefs, attitudes and practices of members of the participating denominations. In addition to validating and up-dating that profile, the 1989 study sought to identify trends "that would provide clues regarding the impact of modernization" (274, 45). It also added questions to explore in-group identity, male-female roles, and other aspects not included in 1972. Most of the trends revealed by the study were not unexpected. Mennonite Brethren have changed most and Brethren in Christ least in the intervening 17 years (46). But "similarities between these five bodies [remain] more significant than their differences" (214). And, of course, on most items the whole range of responses was represented in each denomination. The five groups are very close to each other when compared with the largerecumenical scene in North America. From time to time the authors make helpful comparisons of their findings with similar data from surveys of other religious bodies (e.g. Reginald Bibby in Canada) or national samples (e.g. Gallup poll). The 86 tables provide a wealth of summarized data. The authors have presented this information in very accessible form and added helpful interpretation in each case. Especially valuable are the tables of correlations made possible by computer analysis. Conference and congregational leaders as well as those involved in Mennonite educational and community organizations will benefit greatly from a study of the presented data. If the authors have not identified as many practical implications as some readers would like, the information is there to draw one's own conclusions. The study gives major attention to the impact of modernization. In an occasional lapse from social scientific detachment it even becomes the "onslaught" of modernization (15 1,157).Relating it to technological society, the authors use five Book Re12iew.s 211 dimensions or indicators of modernization: education, urbanization, mobility, occupational rank, and income. All five denominations have become more urban and increased in educational attainment since 1972 (MBs most; BiCs least); professional, business and clerical ranks have grown, while farm and labour segments are down: urbanization has increased mobility. 111 that "objective" sense, then, Mennonites have clearly modernized during the past 17 years. An important question is how this nlodernization will have affectedMennon- ite identity: "beliefs, values, attitudes, and behaviour" (45). How far will it have led in the direction of greater secularization, individualism, and materialism ("con- comitants of modernization") as social theory predicts it should? The answer is unclear. In fact, contrary to expectation, higher education andsocio-economic status correlate negatively with secularism and individualism (100, 243). Sinularly surprising is the finding that the age distribution of those scoring high on all three concomitants of modernization is not lineas, but concave, with teenagers and the over 70 group higher than the three intermediate groups (268). This raises important questions for the authors. Is the assumption that secularism, individualism, and materialism are concomitants of modernization wrong? Do Mennonites simply not fit the expected pattern? (243) Readers may further wonder: did the questionnaire gather adequate data, and were the scales of "secularism" etc., appropriately defined? To that the authors might well respond in the words of Kauffman and Harder in their report of the 1972 survey: Of course, the validity of such findings depends much on the way the questions were asked and the scales defined. There is a sense, however, in which their meaning transcends the researchers' ability to control the instrument. Church members responded to over three hundred questions and gave a wide range of answers on many subjects. When a conglomerate of information is fed into the computer and it reports plus and minus correlations of various magnitudes, we are pushed to make sense of the reports whether or not we have defined the factors in advance (Arlnbnptists Fo~rr- Cerlt~rr-iesLater-, 33 1 ). Some interesting findings: scores on "devotionalism" were unchanged from 1972; (84) opposition to abortion has significantly increased for all of the options offered, from pregnancy resulting from rape to "does not want baby;" (1 95) farmers are the category in which the highest percentage has a household income below $30,000; (40) males Inore strongly support women in leadership roles than do females in 13 of 14 categories, from "worship leader" (73-70%) to "conduct ordinations" (41-33%)(263).Chapter 10, comparing the five denominations, shows MCs and GCs to be the most compatible with each other, although fewer than one fourth of either group favours "uniting with another Mennonite or BIC group" (228). In a number of areas there appears to be a considerable gap between attitude (what people believe) and behaviour (what they do). Thus, 84% agreed that "members of our denomination should vote in public" elections (76% in 1972) but only 65% did so in recent years (46% in 1972) (138). Fifteen percent believed that youth should refuse to register with the draft, but only 3% would take that position if faced with the draft (174). Tables 2 to 4 in chapter 11 show a consistent spread between "moral attitudes" and "moral behaviour," with attitudes generally but not always rating higher. The authors might have given more attention to this than their brief comments (1 94f). My few criticisms are not meant to detract from the value of this study. The historical contexts plrovided in the introduction of a number of the chapters are usually carefully stated. Elsewhere imprecise remarksjar unnecessarily: e.g.that the Evangelical Mennonites split away from the "Old" Mennonites (149) when the latter had been equated with the MCs on the previous page; or the curious juxtaposing of Menno Simons and Thomas Muentzer (258) when Menno and Jan van Leyden or even Hubmaier would have been much more appropriate. Similarly, survey results are usually interpreted carefully and precisely, avoiding unwarranted cause-effect language. Elsewhere less care is evident: e.g. "with urbanization came greater interest in education" (37) [vice versa?] or "agrarian lifestyle brought with it large extended families, strongly patriarchal." When the categories "liberal" and "conservative" are used in comparing Mennonite groups or positions, the results are often unenlightening. Kauffman and Driedger (21Of) introduce the terms carefully and give them specific content from the survey questions. Even so it becomes problematic to identify those who hold strongly to pacifism as "liberal" (236) when that belief is identified as a central element of Anabaptist orthodoxy. Identity and modernization may not have been the most central questions to address in this survey, as some of the ambiguous results suggest. Nevertheless, the book contains an enormous wealth of information to stimulate further study, interpretation and extrapolation. It will undoubtedly become a basis for many important decisions within the five conference bodies in the decade ahead. Adolf Ens Canadian Mennonite Bible College C.J.Dyck, William E. Keeney, and A.J.Beachey, eds., Tlze Writings of Dirk Plzilips (Classics of tlze Radical Refor~~zatio~z,Volume 6)( Scottdale and Waterloo: Herald Press, 1992). 701 pages. The writings of DirkPhilips are generally little known, even though his name is familiar to students of Mennonite history as an important co-worker of Menno Simons, and, as translators and editors have insisted, his writings are more accessible than those of Menno in the sense of being more clearly written. In fact, DirkPhilips (perhaps more correctly Dirk Philipsz) writings have been available in a useful translation since 1910, that by A. Kolb and published by J.F.Funk (reprinted in Bonk Reliebc~s 213 1978). A German translati011of the Eizcl~iridioi~oclei- HrrizrlDuclzleii~was published in the USA in I8 1 1. It is chiefly this book that was made available in English by Kolb. The editors of the Classics series decided on anew translation of this work and others by Dirk Philips for several reasons, perhaps most importantly because of their desire to "annotate or contextualize the documents within the framework of Dirks' life and thought." There is no doubt that this volume adds valuable information to the texts thenlselves, thus making these works available to a new, more general readership. From alimited sampling withinits more than 700pages
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